


Hedgehog ransom

by shewarbler



Category: Dalton Academy Series
Genre: Crack, Gen, IT'S ALL CRACK, This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever written
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 21:52:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14881889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shewarbler/pseuds/shewarbler
Summary: "Derek sighed heavily, “Okay look, don’t freak out, but…we…might have…lost Sonic.”“You what?!”"Logan and Derek are the worst temporary parents ever.





	Hedgehog ransom

They were embarrassed at how long it took them to figure it out, really. Julian had been gone for almost a week, and they had taken turns in keeping Sonic in their respective rooms throughout his time away filming (he was a noisy little hedgehog, most active at night, and after Derek’s second sleepless night he had passed Sonic over to Logan in favour of a good night’s rest). Due to this, they had both figured Sonic was simply in the others’ room, and had no reason to ask so just…didn’t check in.

Their blissful ignorance continued until Julian had texted to say he was boarding his plane and would be back that evening, and Logan figured they should probably return Sonic to his room in time for Julian arriving. Usually cuddling Sonic was Julian’s first priority when coming home from his trips – napping second, coffee third and socialising with Derek and Logan only after the previous tasks had been fulfilled. Finally accustomed to this routine, Derek and Logan agreed to head back after classes and get Sonic settled.

This was when they realised the problem.

Both boys stood outside Julian’s door greeting each other with puzzled expressions.

“Oh, you already put him inside. How is he? Do we need to get anything?” Derek asked, gesturing to Logan’s empty hands.

Logan frowned at him in response, “Why are you asking me? I don’t have him. He’s been in your room the past two days.”

“What? He’s been with you.” Derek insisted.

“You had him last Derek!”

“No, _you_ had him last!”

There was a terse pause, during which both boys were slowly coming to the same conclusion. Confusion slowly transformed into dread.

“Derek…where is Sonic?” Logan asked with closed eyes, trying to remain composed despite his internal freak out.

A faint explosion rattled through the air, making them both utter the same word.

“ _Windsor._ ”

* * *

The front doors to Windsor crashed open, and before Charlie could wonder what else could possibly go wrong with his day, Derek’s voice rang through the halls. “Alright fuckers! Where the fuck is he?!”

“Charlie! He said a bad language word!”

“Two of them!” Wes and David called back from the kitchen

“Now you apply my rule…” Charlie muttered as he regretfully turned to Derek. “Derek. What can we do for you? You Stuarts never come here unless you want something.”

“I want your usual suspects lined up; they’ve gone _too far_ this time! Where is he?!” Derek demanded, glaring hard at Charlie.

Charlie crossed his arms over his chest and narrowed his eyes at Derek, “I can’t say I’m surprised, but what exactly are you accusing us of?”

“Sonic! Where is he?!” Derek was still yelling, causing a few tentative heads to lean over the banister and out from within the kitchen.

“Sonic? Isn’t that Julian’s hedgehog? I’ve never even seen the dam thing before.” Charlie said defensively.

Derek glanced over Charlie’s shoulder and saw a pair of matching blonde heads poking out from the kitchen. He instantly shouldered past Charlie and headed for the door, “You two! Where is he?”

Evan and Ethan disappeared behind the door before Derek could reach them, but he barged in regardless, determined to confront the troublemakers. He wasn’t even fazed by the mess that greeted him – broken glass littered every surface, mixed with bright purple goo that stuck Derek’s shoes to the floor instantly. Derek’s suspects were all there, holding brooms and mops and cloths, and all looking surprised to see him looking so angry in their kitchen.

“Why so angry, King of Hearts?” one Twin asked - he didn’t know which one, it didn’t matter.

“Yeah, it’s not like you were affected by this…incident.” Kurt said suspiciously, gesturing to the general mess around them.

“…as much as we wanted you to be.” The other twin said, earning a collective, defeated sigh from the entire room.

“What are you- in fact, no. I don’t want to know.” Derek started to say, “And stop calling me that!” he pointed threateningly at the Twins, who just smiled angelically at him. “Alright, one of you took Sonic, now where is he?”

Everyone in the room frowned in response and side eyed each other questioningly. No one responded.

“I’m serious! This isn’t funny! Julian is going to be home tonight and he’s gonna freak if Sonic isn’t there. And who has to deal with that? _Me_!” Derek shouted, frustrations’ growing as the Windsor’s continued to look at him with puzzled expressions.

“What would we want with Sonic? He’s just a hedgehog…” Reed asked quietly, his hair splattered with purple.

“Because you like to fuck with us!”

The boys in the kitchen had never heard Derek yell so loudly before, some even winced when he accused them of…what exactly? Charlie stepped in and tried to form a barrier between Derek and the confused boys.

“Derek, I don’t think they know what you’re talking about. How about you calm down and we can figure it out.” Charlie’s tone was only mildly threatening.

“No, they know exactly what I’m talking about! You kidnapped Sonic! God only knows what you’ve done to him!” Derek accused.

The frowns around the room deepened, telling Charlie that for once the troublemakers genuinely didn’t know what was going on.

“Kidnapped Sonic? What?” David asked.

The Twins looked at each other, mild looks of surprise on their faces, as if to say _we hadn’t even considered that._

“That’s ridiculous. No one here would go _that_ far, we all know Sonic is important to Julian.” Blaine defended his friends, knowing it was true.

“Oh really? What about Pavarotti huh?” Derek challenged.

No one could really deny that.

Derek’s phone buzzed repeatedly before he could continue. He took one glance at it and groaned loudly before he turned to leave. “This isn’t over! I’ll be back!”

The text still lit up his phone as he pocketed it;

_“Julian’s home early! I repeat, Julian’s home early! SOS!!!!!!!!”_

The doors slammed closed, and not even a second later Charlie had whirled around to fix them all with a deathly glare, “Alright. Talk.”

* * *

Julian’s bags had barely hit the floor before he was headed toward the stairs, the thought of a long nap in his own bed the only thing motivating his legs to carry him any further. He slumped toward his dorm room, ignoring the friendly greetings from other Stuarts on his way, but was surprised to see Logan standing awkwardly by his open door. Logan immediately straightened up and plastered on a smile when he saw Julian approach.

“Hey! Julian! So good to see you! How was LA? Did you get offered any new roles? Don’t worry, nothing much is new here everything is _totally_ normal.” Logan rambled, fidgeting with the buttons on his blazer.

Julian winced and held up a hand to stop Logan, “Have you been drinking stronger coffee? Too many questions. Now move, I have a six hour nap schedueled.”

Julian sidestepped Logan and moved to enter his room, causing Logan to jump into action. He suddenly leapt into the doorway, effectively blocking Julian’s way. The actor raised an eyebrow at the Prefect.

“Can I help you?” he asked incredulously.

Logan’s smile tightened, making Julian suspicious, “Just…um…just wanting to catch up. I’ve missed you!”

“You…missed me. Right.” Julian said disbelievingly. He caught Logan glancing anxiously over his shoulder into the room and tried to follow his gaze, stretching on his tip toes to see over Logan’s shoulder, “Logan, what’s going on?”

“Nothing!” Logan said too quickly. He lifted his elbow to rest on the door frame in front of Julian’s view, trying to disguise it by scratching at the back of his head. “Nothing’s going on. Do you want to go for coffee? Yeah, let’s do that. Let’s grab a coffee. Downstairs.”

Logan swiftly moved and tried to guide Julian away from his room with a hand on his back, but Julian dodged his grip and turned back to his room, eyeing Logan suspiciously the whole time, “As much as I admire your sudden keen interest in my life, I’m tired. I’m jet lagged. I want to nap. Let me nap.”

Julian disappeared through the doorway and Logan flailed hopelessly for a moment. He considered running away right then, just turning heel and fleeing, leaving Derek to deal with the fall out. He also considered just coming clean, saving the trouble of trying to hide it. Maybe they could find Sonic together. Fortunately he didn’t have to make the decision – Derek did.

Derek jogged up the stairs to find Logan and hissed frantically at him, “They claim not to have him! You speak Windsor, you’re going to have to go over there and figure it out!”

“What do you mean _I speak Windsor?!_ How can they not have him?!” Logan replied, maybe a little louder than necessary.

“Charlie seemed to think they were telling the truth – they said they wouldn’t touch Sonic. If he believed them it must be true.” Derek muttered back.

“What about Sonic?” Julian asked, suddenly materialising beside them. Logan and Derek froze instantly, staring at each other with wide, panicked eyes as Julian quizzed them, “Where is he anyway? I thought you guys would have put him back in my room by now.”

Derek cleared his throat awkwardly. Logan shifted uncomfortably on his feet. Neither one said anything.

“He’s…um…we…took him…to…the groomers! Yeah, we took him to the groomers.” Derek managed to stutter out while Logan nodded determinedly.

Julian stared at them incredulously. “What? You can’t…hedgehogs don’t need to be _groomed_.”

“Oh. Well, he’s…getting some spa treatment?” Logan offered hopefully.

It didn’t work.

Julian crossed his arms across his chest and looked between his two friends, “Alright. I’m not an idiot. Tell me what’s going on. Now.”

Derek sighed heavily, “Okay look, don’t freak out, but…we…might have…lost Sonic.”

From down the hall, even over his headphones, Bailey could hear the eruption from Julian.

“You _what_?!”

A pause.

“He’s been gone for _how long?!_ Where is my hedgehog?!”

* * *

From inside Windsor, Charlie rubbed at his aching temples. He sat on the coffee table, elbows on his knees and face solemn. Behind him, the usual Windsor troublemakers stood watching the interaction in awe. Evan and Ethan wore matching grins, only hiding them when Charlie glanced back. Wes and David looked extremely amused. Blaine looked impressed. Charlie looked pained.

“Alright…run it through for me one more time. I can’t believe you lot have done this…”  Charlie asked the freshmen sitting in front of him, who looked at each other hesitantly as they fidgeted nervously.

“We didn’t think it would be that big a deal…honestly…” one of them began quietly.

“Yeah…I mean he was just sitting there. No one seemed to be that interested in him…” the one in the middle continued.

“And after hearing about what you guys did with Pavarotti last time…we thought…” the third one followed.

“You thought it would get you a good rep with us?” Evan offered helpfully, his eyes twinkling in delight even when Charlie glared at him.

The three freshmen nodded sheepishly.

Sonic snuffled quietly from his cage on the table.

Charlie let out a suffering sigh, “Right. Here’s what we’re gonna do…”

David leaned into a giggling Wes to whisper, “I can’t believe these guys pulled this off _just to impress us_.”

“I know right? I’m flattered they would risk their lives to get our attention.” Wes turned his giggles into a cough when Charlie glowered at him next, schooling his features into a serious expression – which melted the second he turned away.

Evan and Ethan were giving discrete thumbs up to the freshmen, thoroughly impressed with their efforts. The one in the middle of the three, Clay, bit his lip to hold back a smile as he glanced at them. “I think we need to start paying more attention to our freshmen. They’ve clearly been paying attention to us.” Evan whispered to the boys closest to him.

“Julian is gonna be so pissed…” Blaine sighed, “Why would they think this was a good idea?! Even you two wouldn’t touch Sonic.”

Charlie cleared his throat pointedly, glaring at the lot of them. “Now, credit where credit is due, this was stupid.”

“But…you guys break into Stuart all the time?” the one on the end, Kaelen, defended timidly.

“While true, stealing Sonic isn’t just an ordinary prank. He’s like…the crown jewels of Stuart.” Wes stated, much to Charlie’s dismay. He waved them off.

“You have to take Sonic back.” Charlie said sternly, resulting in outcries from the other boys in the room.

“What?! To Stuart?!”

“Alone? They’ll be killed!”

“And we’ve only just realised their potential!”

Charlie waited for the arguments to die down before he continued, smirking in their direction, “Then you lot can go with them.”

* * *

The few members of Stuart house who had stuck around after Julian’s explosion now watched on in mild amusement at the scene playing out in their common room. Logan and Derek perched on the edge of the couch, eyes on the floor and resembling small children being scolded by their parent - if their parent was a Hollywood film star. Julian paced frantically back and forth in front of them, arms flailing wildly as he continued his angry lecture.

“What if he’s being held for ransom, huh? Am I gonna receive a threatening letter in a couple of hours demanding money for his return? A hedgehog ransom? You both are going to cover the costs of his recuperation! And buy him treats! God you two are the _worst_ babysitters. Derek how your parents trust you to look after Amanda is beyond me.”

He paused for a moment, breathing heavily and glaring hard at both his so-called friends.

“And _another thing-_ “

“Hello Cheshire. We believe this belongs to you.” Ethan interrupted cheerfully.

Julian whirled around on his heel and found himself faced with the main Windsor conspirators and a trio of faces he didn’t completely recognise, but the second he realised what one of them was holding their identity became irrelevant. Behind him, Logan and Derek visibly sagged in relief, puffs of breath escaping their lips.

“ _Sonic!_ Oh my god there you are.” Julian hurried over to the group, grabbing the small cage from Clay’s hands immediately. He raised it to his eye level and inspected inside carefully, causing Sonic to peer out from his nesting. “ _What did you do to him_?”

The three boys at the front fidgeted nervously, while the usual troublemakers smiled innocently. It was unnerving. Wes nudged one of them forward slightly, David nodded encouragingly.

“Um…we tried to…prank you…” Clay said nervously, avoiding eye contact with Julian’s steely glare.

“And _why_ would you include my Sonic in these pranks?” Julian demanded.

Evan nudged Neil, the third freshmen forward. “We wanted to…to impress…them.” He gestured loosely to the Twins, who beamed proudly.

Silence fell over the room for a second as Julian glanced between them all, hugging Sonic’s cage protectively.

“Wait, so you mean to say you lot _didn’t_ have anything to do with this?” Derek asked with a frown.

“Nope. Just like we told you. We’re totally innocent.” Evan chirped happily. Logan scoffed in return.

“You are in no position to be acting innocent Logan.” Julian warned him with a glare.

“Oh come on, of course it was Windsor! It’s not our fault!”

Wes, David and the Twins wrapped their arms around the freshmen, “They are still young, just rookies in terms of pranking. But once we train them, show them the Windsor way, they’ll know the rules. Don’t worry, Sonic is safe.” Wes reassured the actor.

Julian seemed to consider his words, before finally settling narrowed eyes on the freshmen, “You’ll leave Sonic alone?”

They nodded vigorously. “We’re sorry…we just…wanted to fit in.”

Julian’s face softened the slightest bit, “Alright. Go, before I change my mind.”

Logan and Derek gaped behind him as the Windsor’s scurried out, “What?! That’s it?! We practically get beheaded and you let them off free?!”

It would have been comical, the swiftness with which Julian could change his facial expression, if it wasn’t so terrifying. The soft look he used when peering into Sonic’s cage was monumentally different to the deathly glare he fixed Logan and Derek with less than a second later.

“This isn’t over. But Sonic and I need to recover from this stressful experience. So I want you two to sit there and think about what you’ve done. I’ll be back after our nap.” Julian said simply, turning on his heel and striding from the room.

Derek and Logan watched him go, looked at each other, and promptly burst out laughing.

Hours later, when Julian still hadn’t returned, Logan wandered to his room to ask if he wanted to go out for dinner, hopeful that the whole thing would have blown over by now. He expected to find Julian pouring over yet another script already, but what Logan saw instead made him smile despite himself. Julian was passed out on his bed, limbs sprawled everywhere and snoring lightly, comforter tucked around his waist. Sonic was curled in a ball on his chest, little nose nuzzling against Julian’s shirt.

“What an adorable pair of assholes.” Logan murmured to himself, snapping a picture simultaneously.


End file.
